[Dialogue] Why wars?

[Ann Shafer]

I just received mail from the American Friends Service Committee pointing
out that this is how we spend our money in this country - Military
Department of Defense, Veterans Affairs and Nuclear Weapons programs = 60%,
Health and Human Services = 7 %, Education = 6 %, State = 5 %, Other
Programs = 4 %, Department of Homeland Security = 3.5%, Housing and Urban
Development = 3 %, Justice = 2 %, Agriculture = 2 %, NASA = 1.5 %, Energy
excluding nuclear weapons programs = 1 %, Labor = 1 %, Treasury = 1 %,
Interior = 1 %, Environmental Protection Agency = 1 %, Transportation = 1 %.
Their letter says that the United States spent $1,107,446,00,000 (that's
more than 1 trillion dollars) on the military last year. The AFSC points out
that the U.S. spends as much on our military as the combined totals of the
next 15 largest budgets: China, Russia, Britain, France, Japan, Germany,
Saudi Arabia, South Korea, India, Brazil, Italy, Austria, Canada, Indonesia
and the Netherlands. They figure we spend about $2.1 million every minute
for war and so called defense. They are trying to raise that amount for
their peace programs and they are entreating the president to shift our
national resources from war to peace efforts. See www.OneMinuteForPeace.org
for details. Ann Shafer

 

From: dialogue-bounces at wedgeblade.net
[mailto:dialogue-bounces at wedgeblade.net] On Behalf Of Geri Tolman
Sent: Saturday, September 03, 2011 6:47 AM
To: 'Colleague Dialogue'
Subject: [Dialogue] Why wars?

 

The recent string on CS-1 & cultural shifts intersected with my current
pondering on how we get into wars.

Can anyone recommend a reading list re: history of wars?  What got us into
them?

 

I've added Kazin's new book to my list. 

Have you read or heard of any other books similar Jared Diamond's Guns,
Germs and Steel (examining major trends and influences at various points in
history)?

 

thanks,

Geri Tolman

 

P.S.  after taking our granddaughters to a planetarium show and the Viet Nam
War Memorial, back-to-back, the 11yo was very sad so I sat down with her for
a few moments.  She said, "this planet is such a small spec in the universe
and we have such great technology, you'd think we could figure out how not
to have wars that kill all these people."

 

 

 

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